KitKat sent Drogba home to launch its 100% sustainable cocoa switch

Celebrate and raise awareness of KitKat as the first global confectionery brand sourced from 100% sustainable cocoa, for a consumer audience increasingly socially conscious, launching February 8, 2016.

Films follow Didier Drogba home to Côte d'Ivoire — a football break with kids at a Cocoa Plan school — sharing the break with cocoa farmers.

Four documentary-style films hosted on YouTube and narrated by Louis Cole (Fun for Louis, 1.6 million subscribers), directed by Ollie Murray through My Accomplice; the central film captures Drogba's return home, playing football with children at a local school and showcasing his charitable foundation, amplified across KitKat's YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

The campaign tied the break ritual to the Cocoa Plan's on-the-ground facts — 42 schools completed in Côte d'Ivoire, improving education for 10,000 children and helping prevent child labour — with Drogba's foundation partnership continuing the work.

In February 2016, Nestlé KITKAT and Team Iconic at J. Walter Thompson unveiled a campaign to celebrate and raise awareness of KitKat as the first global confectionery brand sourced from 100% sustainable cocoa. The Nestlé Cocoa Plan aims to improve the lives of cocoa farmers and the quality of their product through better farming, better lives and better cocoa.

The campaign launched on February 8 with four documentary-style films hosted on YouTube, narrated by Louis Cole, the socially conscious YouTube star known as Fun for Louis to his 1.6 million subscribers. The central film captures world-renowned footballer Didier Drogba's return home to his native Côte d'Ivoire, one of the largest cocoa-producing regions in the world, as he enjoys a football break with children in a local school and showcases his charitable foundation.

The Cocoa Plan's work in the country gave the story substance: 42 schools completed, improving the quality of education for 10,000 children and helping prevent child labour. Drogba said he was proud of the partnership between his foundation and Nestlé, which 'will help continue to make a difference to the education and lives of children in the Côte d'Ivoire.'

Global creative director Marcus Woolcott framed the evolution: 'Have a Break' is so engrained in the KitKat brand that helping it evolve into sustainability — sharing a break with those who grow the cocoa — was the natural next chapter. A suite of social content amplified the films across KitKat's owned channels globally.

Sustainability claims are abstractions; a hometown return by Côte d'Ivoire's biggest football icon made the Cocoa Plan's schools concrete.

Drogba brought both credibility and his own foundation, so the story continued beyond the campaign flight.

Louis Cole's audience matched the socially conscious consumers the message targeted, lending the documentaries a native voice.

The 'break' ritual gave the sustainability story a brand-specific shape — a football break with kids — instead of a generic origin film.

A 60-year-old tagline can stretch to sustainability if the brand finds the moment where its ritual and its supply chain meet — here, a football break at a school built by cocoa money.

The films and social content ran globally from February 8, 2016, positioning KitKat's 100% sustainable cocoa sourcing — with the Cocoa Plan's 42 completed schools and 10,000 children reached — as the proof behind the break, and Drogba's foundation partnership continued in Côte d'Ivoire.